Modelling climate evolution through the last interglacial

The last interglacial, from approximately 130-116 kyr before present (often referred to as the Eemian), was a period of sustained warmth which serves as a partial analogue for future, warmer climate conditions. Polar ice-core data suggest that temperatures at high latitudes were up to 4°C higher than during the pre-industrial, and a recent assessment of eustatic sea level concluded that a high-stand of up to 9m is consistent with available data. This implies that parts of either the Greenland or Antarctic ice sheets (or both) were ablated relative to present, suggesting that climate conditions were very different from the recent past. An important forcing mechanism during the early part of the last interglacial was the increased level of incident solar radiation in the Northern Hemisphere summer resulting from the particular configuration of Earth’s orbit at this time. However, the climate system response is complicated by numerous feedback mechanisms which can be (partially) accounted for in coupled climate model evaluations.